Crab Studio

Professor Sir Peter Cook
Born
Southend-on Sea, 22/10/1936

Studied
1953 – 1958 Bournemouth College of Art
1958 – 1960 Architectural Association, London

Professor Sir Peter Cook RA, founder of Archigram, former Director the Institute for Contemporary Art, London (the ICA) and Bartlett School of Architecture at University Col­lege, London has been a pivotal figure within the global architectural world for over half a century. His ongoing con­tribution to architectural innovation was rec­ognised via the conferral of an honorary doctorate in April 2010 by the Lund University, Sweden. Peter’s achieve­ments with radical experimentalist group Archigram have been the subject of numerous publications and public ex­hibitions and were recognised by the Royal Institute of Brit­ish Architects in 2002, when members of the group were awarded the RIBA’s highest award, the Royal Gold Medal.

In 2007, Peter was knighted by the Queen for his servic­es to architecture. He is also a Royal Academician and a Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres of the French Republic. Peter is currently a Senior Fellow of the Royal College of Art, London. His professor­ships include those of the Royal Academy, University College London and the Hochschule fur Bildende Kunste (Staedelschule) in Frankfurt-Main, Germany.

Peter has from the very beginning made waves in architectural circles, how­ever, it is since the construction of his Art Museum in Graz, Austria (the Kunsthaus) that his work has been brought to a wider public, a process that has continued at CRAB with the completion of the much published and awarded Law School for the WU in Vienna, Architecture School for Bond University in Australia and recently completed Drawing Studio for Arts University Bournemouth. Peter has also built in Osaka, Nagoya, Berlin, Frankfurt and Madrid.

Peter’s continuing work as a lecturer of considerable renown makes him a familiar voice within cultural institutions around the world, where many have enjoyed an opportunity to hear Peter expound (among other subjects) upon his love affair with the slithering, the swarming and the spooky.